Method and system for mobile email adaptation

ABSTRACT

The present invention discloses a method and system for mobile email adaptation, which sets an adaptation server separated from the mail proxy server, while a mobile email server can ask the adaptation server to fulfill the adaptation function for the content of the mail. Therefore, the adaptation function is stripped from the mail proxy server, the burden on the proxy server is decreased, and the possible bottleneck of the system is avoided. And the adaptation is concentrated in the adaptation server of the mobile email server end, instead of being distributed into each proxy server. So it is more convenient for concentrative manage and function upgrade. As a plurality of mobile email servers could access the same adaptation server, the network organization is more convenient and flexible.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of International Patent ApplicationNo. PCT/CN2006/002837, filed Oct. 24, 2006, which claims priority toChinese Patent Application No. 200510101683.0, filed Nov. 19, 2005,entitled “ADAPTING METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR MOBILE MAIL TERMINAL,” both ofwhich are hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to communication technology and moreparticularly to a method and system for mobile email adaptation.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

With the development of mobile communication technology, application ofthe Internet has been widely extended to mobile communication field. Thethird generation mobile communication technology accelerated theconvergence of the telecom network and the Internet. The extension ofthe Internet application to the mobile network expands the servicecapability of mobile network, but the inherent characteristics of themobile network raises new requirement for these applications. Email isplaying an important role in the application of the Internet. The mobileemail service is the extension of conventional Internet email, whichsupports editing, receiving and sending email through a mobile terminal,and may perform seamless convergence with email service of the Internet.

The mobile email service mentioned above is an application for safelyaccessing email server through wireless access manner and performingcorresponding processing for the information. With the development ofmobile data service, terminals adapted for various services arecharacterized by diversity. Network equipment has to inevitably confrontdiverse terminals. In the meantime, in order to improve user loyalty anduser experience, it will become a certain trend of service operation toprovide individualized service for users. The diversity of mobileterminals and the differentiation of the software and hardware platformof mobile terminals need the service provider to adapt the content toachieve a maximal matching for the terminals when the service providerprovides service. In addition, individualization demand becomes more andmore intense when a mobile user subscribes to the service. This requeststhe operator and the service provider to provide individualized servicefor users. The individualized customization demand for the content pagesof service is usually included.

In a word, in order to support the mobile terminal to send or receiveemail and seamlessly converge with the email service of the Internet,the following problems should be solved firstly: the display of emailpictures (format, size, color bit), the display of mail text attachments(formats of files with diverse category, big mail), and theindividualized display based on a user terminal. All of these should beadapted according to the capability of the mobile terminal so as to besmoothly displayed in the mobile terminal.

A method for realizing email adaptation function discussed in “Exploreof Service Model Based on Storage and Forward” (Lin Wenhong, ASPireDigital Technologies (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd., CHINA DATA COMMUNICATIONS,APR. 2005, No. 4) includes: introducing a mail proxy server serving as afront-end equipment of each mail server and realizing the adaptation inthe proxy server. As shown in FIG. 1, the flow of the traffic mode is asfollows.

Step a) A user A, via a terminal like a mobile phone, or a computer,sends a mail to a mail server, where the mail is to be sent to a user B.

Step b) The mail server sends an arrival notification of new mail to theuser B;

Step c) The user B sends a mail request to a mail proxy server via thecurrent terminal.

Step d) The mail proxy server transfers the mail request to the mailserver via the protocol of Post Office Protocol 3 (POP3) or the SimpleMail Transfer Protocol (SMTP).

Step e) The mail server sends the requested mail to the mail proxyserver;

Step f) The mail proxy server adapts the mail according to thecapability set information in the mail request of the user B.

Step g) The mail proxy server sends the adapted mail to the user B.

This provides a method for realizing an email adaptation function hasthe following disadvantages. The regular mail proxy function and theadaptation function are both achieved in the mail proxy server becausethe mail proxy server is located between the mail server and a client.This may become the system bottleneck in some cases. Besides, it is notconvenient for centralized management and upgrading because theadaptation is achieved in every mail proxy server.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The object of the present invention is to provide a method and systemfor mobile email adaptation to solve the problem of system bottleneckeasily happening in the prior art and the inconvenience for centralizedmanagement and upgrading.

In order to accomplish the above object, the present invention providesa method for mobile email adaptation, including following steps.

A mobile email server receives a mail request from a terminal;

The mobile email server acquires capability set information of theterminal according to the mail request;

The mobile email server sends the capability set information and therequested mail to an adaptation server;

The mobile email server receives an adapted mail, wherein the adaptedmail is adapted according to the capability set information and returnedby the adaptation server which performs adaptation for the mail; and

The mobile email server sends the adapted mail to the terminal.

In the method mentioned above, the mobile email server preliminarilyjudges whether the mail needs to be adapted according to the capabilityset information; and directly sends the requested mail to the terminalif the mail does not need to be adapted.

In the method mentioned above, the preliminary judgment is about whetherthe sending terminal of the mail and the terminal are the same type ofterminal; and the adaptation is not needed if the sending terminal ofthe mail and the terminal are the same type of terminal.

In the method mentioned above, the mobile email server judges whetherthe requested mail has portions needing to be adapted according to thecapability set information; the mobile email server directly sends themail to the terminal if there is not portion needing to be adapted; andthe mobile email sever sends the portion needing to be adapted and thecapability set information to the adaptation server if there areportions needing to be adapted. The adaptation server performsadaptation for the portions needing to be adapted according to thecapability set information and returns the adapted portion back.

In the method mentioned above, the mobile email server acquires thecapability set information of the terminal according to the uniformresource identifier in the mail request.

In the method mentioned above, the adaptation server judges whether thecontent of the mail needs to be adapted before performing the adaptationfor the mail according to the capability set information.

In the method mentioned above, the step of judging whether the contentof the mail needs to be adapted by the adaptation server includes anyone or more of the following: judging whether the terminal is compatiblewith the attachment format of the mail, judging whether the terminal iscompatible with the size of the mail, judging whether the terminal iscompatible with the multimedia information contained in the mail.

In order to accomplish above object, the present invention furtherprovides a system for mobile email adaptation, including: a mobile emailserver configured to be capable of communicating with an adaptationserver and receive a mail request sent by a terminal, acquire capabilityset information of the terminal according to the mail request, send thecapability set information and requested mail to an adaptation server,receive an adapted mail, wherein the adapted mail is adapted accordingto the capability set information and returned by the adaptation serverwhich performs adaptation for the mail, and send the adapted mail to theterminal;

The adaptation server is configured to receive the capability setinformation and the requested mail sent by the mobile email server,perform adaptation for the mail according to the capability setinformation, and return the adapted mail back to the mobile emailserver.

In the system mentioned above, the adaptation server is connected with aplurality of mobile email servers.

In order to accomplish above objects, the present invention furtherprovides a mobile email server, including:

a module configured to receive a mail request sent by a terminal;

a module configured to acquire capability set information of theterminal according to the mail request;

a module configured to send the capability set information and requestedmail to an adaptation server;

a module configured to receive the adapted mail, wherein the adaptedmail is adapted according to the capability set information and returnedby the adaptation server which performs adaptation for the mail; and

a module, configured to send the adapted mail to the terminal.

By adopting above-mentioned technical solution, the present inventionmay achieve following advantages:

1) In the present invention, the adaptation function is realized bybeing concentrated in the adaptation server which is separated from themail proxy server, while the mobile email server can ask the adaptationserver to fulfill the adaptation function for the content of the mail.It is convenient for the centralized management. The adaptationupgrading for the whole system can be simply completed in AS. This isequivalent to provide a uniform mail adaptation service entity andinterface for terminals and other servers, e.g. mail proxy serverslocated at every enterprise, provide a much more effective approach forthe interaction and share, and meet the need of fast increase of networkmail information. Furthermore, in practical application, a plurality ofmobile email servers may access the same adaptation server. The networkorganization becomes more flexible and convenient. The correspondingconfiguration and optimization may be performed according to thespecific demand of mail information and the network information flow tofurther improve the operation efficiency of the system.

2) In the present invention, the adaptation function is stripped fromthe mail proxy server of the prior art to make the mail proxy serveronly perform the conventional mail proxy function from the mobile emailserver to the terminal so as to effectively reduce the burden of themail proxy server and avoid the system bottleneck in the prior art.Furthermore, repeated configuration for the same adaptation functionresource is avoided by stripping the function from numerous mail proxyservers in the prior art. To a large extent, the present inventionoptimizes the whole resource configuration of the society and has goodeconomy and society benefit.

The present invention will be described in more detail with reference tothe drawings and embodiments.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram illustrating a traffic model of a methodfor mobile email adaptation;

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram illustrating a system for realizing theadaptation of the mobile email in accordance with the present invention;

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram illustrating a traffic flow of a mobileemail in accordance with the present invention;

FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram illustrating a signaling flow of a mobileemail in accordance with the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

As shown in FIG. 2, the present invention includes a mobile email server(MEM Server) and an adaptation server (AS). The adaptation serverperforms information interaction with the mobile email server, judgesthe adaptation capability of a mail according to the capability setinformation, fulfills the corresponding adaptation and returns theadapted mail to the mobile email server. The mobile email serverreceives a mail request from a receiving terminal, acquires an useragent profile (UAprofile) (in this invention, UAprofile is specificallytaken as an example of capability set information) of the receivingterminal, sends the UAprofile and the related mail to the adaptationserver, and sends the adapted mail to the receiving terminal.Furthermore, the mobile email server can fulfill a preliminary judgmentfor the mail adaptation according to the UAprofile. For the sake ofclear illustration, the mail proxy server between the mobile emailserver and the user B, simply adapted to complete the conventional mailproxy function, is omitted in the drawings and following descriptions.

The mobile email server, serving as the core equipment for receiving andsending mails, needs to complete the functions of a conventional mailserver as follows: receiving the mail sent by the mail sender, i.e. theuser A and sending an arrival notification of new mail to the mailreceiver, i.e. the user B. The mobile email server also needs tocomplete the following: receiving the mail request including a uniformresource identifier (URI) in the request information thereof sent by theuser B; acquiring the UAprofile according to the URI of the receivingterminal; sending the requested mail and the UAprofile to the adaptationserver; receiving and sending the adapted mail. The mobile email servermay also have the ability to judge whether the requested mail needs tobe adapted, and if it's judged that portion of the requested mail needsto be adapted, the portion, needing to be adapted, of the requested mailand the UAprofile may be sent to the adaptation server

The adaptation server may be configured to complete the adaptationfunction of a mail, perform the adaptation for the mail or portion ofthe mail (if what the mobile email server sends is portion of the email)according to the UAprofile transferred by the mobile email server, andreturn the adapted mail or portion of the mail to the mobile emailserver. The adaptation sever may also have the ability to judge whetherthe requested mail needs to be adapted and adapt the mail only afterjudging that the requested mail needs to be adapted. The content of themail adaptation completed by the adaptation server may be textadaptation, and/or picture adaptation and/or attachment adaptationaccording to practical demand.

Accompanying FIG. 2 and FIG. 3, the realization process of a method formobile email adaptation in accordance with the present invention isdescribed in detail by describing the flow of mobile email traffic.

I. one mail from the user A to the user B arrives at the mobile emailserver. The communication may adopt the protocol of SMTP;

II. the mobile email server sends a notification to the user B to informthe user B that a new mail has arrived. The notification may adopts thenotice manner of an inband notification (mobile e-mail protocol), anoutband notification (SMS or WAP or SIP Push);

III. the user B initiates a mail request to the mobile email server torequest to download the entire or portion of the content of the mail.The request information includes the URI of the receiving terminal. Therequest may be based on the mail protocol of POP3/IMAP4;

IV. the mobile email server acquires the UAprofile information of thereceiving terminal according to the URI of the receiving terminal,preliminarily judges whether the mail to be downloaded needs to beadapted. The preliminary judgment may include judging the content thatwhether the sending terminal and the receiving terminal are the sametype of mobile terminal. The specific content of judgment may beadjusted and modified according to practical need.

If the preliminary judgment shows that the content of the mail does notneed to be adapted, for example, the type of the sending terminal is thesame as the type of the receiving terminal, the mobile email serverdirectly sends the mail to the user B. If the judgment shows that thecontent of the mail needs to be adapted, the mail requested to bedownloaded and the UAprofile are sent to the adaptation server togetherto perform adaptation. The adaptation request may be based on theprotocol of HTTP;

V. the adaptation server further judges whether the content of the mailneeds to be adapted according to the UAprofile. The further judgment isabout whether the receiving terminal is compatible with the content ofthe mail attachment format, and/or the mail size, and/or the multimediainformation contained in the mail text according to the content of theUAprofile including screen size, browser edition. If the receivingterminal is compatible with the content, it's judged that the adaptationis not needed, the adaptation server returns the mail to the mobileemail server directly;

If the receiving terminal is not compatible with the content, it'sjudged that the adaptation is needed. The adaptation server performscorresponding content adaptation for the mail according to theUAprofile, including picture adaptation, text adaptation, and/orattachment adaptation according to practical demand.

VI. the adaptation server returns the adapted mail to the mobile emailserver. The transmission may be based on the protocol of HTTP;

VII. the mobile email server sends the adapted mail to the user B andstores the original mail in mailbox. Usually, the transmission is basedon the mail protocol of POP3/IMAP4, etc.

As a substitute for the method mentioned above, the preliminary judgmentprocess in step IV, performed by the mobile email server for judgingwhether the mail needs to be adapted, may be omitted. The mail and theUAprofile are directly sent to the adaptation server. The adaptationserver directly performs the adaptation, or judges whether theadaptation is needed and performs the adaptation when it's needed. Themethod decreases the burden of the mobile email server, but may increasethe network flow to some extent between the mobile email server and theadaptation server.

As another substitute for the method mentioned above, the furtherjudgment process in step V, performed by the adaptation server forjudging whether the mail needs to be adapted, may be moved to step IVand be completed together by the mobile email server, after the mobileemail server performs the preliminary judgment. Therefore, the mobileemail server may only send the portions needing to be adapted to theadaptation server for adaptation after the further judgment is made soas to decrease the network flow between the mobile email server and theadaptation server. However, this method may cause burden for the mobileemail server.

Each method mentioned above has its own advantage. In practicalapplication, the method may be measured and chosen according to thecharacteristics of practical traffic. It should be noted that the“adaptation server” represents an entity providing the adaptationfunction in the present invention. The name itself of the entity shouldnot limit the present invention.

In practical operation, the process of information transmission andcommunication in each step of the present invention may be performed bychoosing suitable protocols. The signaling flowchart of the first methodmentioned above is described by choosing specific protocols as follows.Other signaling flow for substitution can be inferred similarly. In themobile email traffic, a mobile email server may send a push notificationto a client by many methods (SMS or WAP Push or SIP Push, etc.). Thefollowing signaling flows take SIP push as an example. Other methods ofpush notification may be inferred similarly. Mail receiving protocolshave POP, and IMAP, etc. The following signaling flow takes IMAP4 as anexample. The signaling flows of other mail receiving protocols may beinferred similarly.

The signaling flowchart in accordance with the present embodiment isshown in FIG. 4.

1. A new mail sent by the user A aiming at the user B arrives at themobile email server. The mobile email server sends a notification to anSIP/IP Core. The SIP/IP Core is a uniform transmission service networkfor providing the traffic of routing, authentication, compression, etc.The push notification mentioned here provides function of routing andaddressing. SIP/IP signaling is routed between a client and a server.

2. The SIP/IP Core transfers the notification to the user B to notifythe user B that a new mail has arrived.

3. The user B sends 200 OK to the SIP/IP Core demonstrating that theabove-mentioned push notification has been received.

4. The SIP/IP Core sends 200 OK to the mobile email server.

5. The user B sends a login order to the mobile email server to requestlogin.

6. The mobile email server returns OK LOGIN completed to the user Bdemonstrating that the login is successful.

7. The user B sends SELECT inbox to the mobile email server to requestto choose an inbox for downloading the mail.

8. The mobile email server returns OK SELECT completed to the user Bdemonstrating that the choosing is completed and it is allowed todownload the mail.

9. The user B sends fetch num portion to the mobile email server torequest to download the entire or portion of the numth mail. The portionmay be full, body [header], and body [text], etc. The URI of thereceiving terminal is contained in the request information.

10. The mobile email server acquires the UAprofile of the receivingterminal according to the URI of the receiving terminal andpreliminarily judges that the content of the mail to be downloaded needsto be adapted (e.g. the sending terminal and the receiving terminal arenot the same type of mobile terminal).

11. The mobile email server applies for a socket to establish theconnection between the adaptation server and the mobile email server.

12. The mobile email server sends an adaptation request to theadaptation server. The method in the request line is post.

13. The adaptation server further judges that the adaptation is neededaccording to the UAprofile and the mail information of the receivingterminal (e.g. the receiving part mobile terminal can not be completelycompatible with the attachment format/mail size sent by the sendingpart) and adapts the content of the mail.

14. The adaptation server returns 200 OK to the mobile email serverdemonstrating a confirmation and returns HTTP response (with adaptedemail data). Finally the mobile email server or the adaptation servercloses the socket. The TCP/IP session ends.

15. The mobile email server sends Ok FETCH completed demonstrating thatthe mail has been successfully sent after sending the adapted numth mailto the user B.

16. The user B sends LOGOUT to the mobile email server requesting to endthe IMAP conversation.

17. The mobile email server email server sends OK LOGOUT completed tothe user B demonstrating the end of the IMAP session of this time.

Though illustration and description of the present disclosure have beengiven in conjunction with the exemplary embodiments thereof, it shouldbe appreciated by persons of ordinary skill in the art that variouschanges in forms and details can be made without deviation from thespirit and scope of this disclosure, which are defined by the appendedclaims.

1. A method for mobile email adaptation, comprising: receiving a mailrequest from a terminal; acquiring capability set information of theterminal according to the mail request; sending the capability setinformation and the requested mail to an adaptation server; receiving anadapted mail, wherein the adapted mail is adapted according to thecapability set information and returned by the adaptation server whichperforms adaptation for the mail; and sending the adapted mail to theterminal.
 2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the method furthercomprises, preliminarily judging, by the mobile email server, whetherthe mail needs to be adapted according to the capability setinformation; sending the capability set information and the requestedmail to the adaptation server if the mail needs to be adapted; directlysending the requested mail to the terminal if the mail does not need tobe adapted.
 3. The method according to claim 2, wherein the preliminaryjudgment about whether the sending terminal of the mail and the terminalare the same type of terminal; and the adaptation is not needed if thesending terminal of the mail and the terminal are the same type ofterminal.
 4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the method furthercomprises, judging, by the mobile email server, whether the requestedmail has portions needing to be adapted according to the capability setinformation; sending directly the mail to the terminal if there is notportion needing to be adapted; sending the portion needing to be adaptedand the capability set information to the adaptation server if there areportions needing to be adapted; performing, by the adaptation server,adaptation for the portions needing to be adapted according to thecapability set information and returning the adapted portion back. 5.The method according to claim 1, wherein the mobile email serveracquires the capability set information of the terminal according to theuniform resource identifier in the mail request.
 6. The method accordingto claim 1, wherein the adaptation server judges whether the content ofthe mail needs to be adapted before performing the adaptation for themail according to the capability set information.
 7. The methodaccording to claim 6, wherein the step of judging whether the content ofthe mail needs to be adapted by the adaptation server comprises any oneor more of the following: judging whether the terminal is compatiblewith the attachment format of the mail, judging whether the terminal iscompatible with the size of the mail, judging whether the terminal iscompatible with the multimedia information contained in the mail.
 8. Asystem for mobile email adaptation, comprising: a mobile email serverconfigured to be capable of communicating with an adaptation server; themobile email server configured to receive a mail request sent by aterminal, acquire capability set information of the terminal accordingto the mail request, send the capability set information and requestedmail to an adaptation server, receive an adapted mail, wherein theadapted mail is adapted according to the capability set information andreturned by the adaptation server which performs adaptation for themail, and send the adapted mail to the terminal; and the adaptationserver configured to receive the capability set information and therequested mail sent by the mobile email server, perform adaptation forthe mail according to the capability set information, and return theadapted mail back to the mobile email server.
 9. The system according toclaim 8, wherein the adaptation server is connected with a plurality ofmobile email servers.
 10. A mobile email server, comprising: a moduleconfigured to receive a mail request sent by a terminal; a moduleconfigured to acquire capability set information of the terminalaccording to the mail request; a module configured to send thecapability set information and requested mail to an adaptation server; amodule configured to receive an adapted mail, wherein the adapted mailis adapted according to the capability set information and returned bythe adaptation server which performs adaptation for the mail; and amodule configured to send the adapted mail to the terminal.